Rick Perry panic fires up the left  —  In his two weeks as a presidential candidate, Rick Perry has done something that neither Barack Obama nor Mitt Romney could do: wake up the left.  —  Perry panic has spread from the conference rooms of Washington, D.C., to the coffee shops of Brooklyn …

Never-Wrong Pundit Picks Obama to Win in 2012  —  Allan Lichtman, the American University professor whose election formula has correctly called every president since Ronald Reagan's 1984 re-election, has a belated birthday present for Barack Obama: Rest easy, your re-election is in the bag.

TIR Exclusive: Palin to Fly to New Hampshire Following Iowa Appearance  —  High level Iowa Republicans tell TheIowaRepublican.com that Sarah Palin will fly to New Hampshire following her September 3rd appearance in central Iowa.  —  Speculation has been swirling about whether or not Palin …

Former Powell Chief of Staff: Cheney “Fears Being Tried as a War Criminal”  —  Former Vice President Dick Cheney's memoir, “In My Time: A Personal and Political Memoir,” is out Tuesday, and it's full of criticism and attacks on his Bush administration colleagues — from describing Condoleezza Rice as …

How The Economy Quietly Entered A Recession On Friday, And Why The GDP Predicts A Sub-Zero Nonfarm Payroll Number  —  While the key market moving event from last Friday may have been Bernanke's Jackson Hole speech which merely left the door open to future QE episodes, the most important event …

How Bill O'Reilly Tried to Get His Wife's Boyfriend Investigated By the Cops  —  Last summer, Fox News anchor Bill O'Reilly came to believe that his wife was romantically involved with another man.  Not just any man, but a police detective in the Long Island community they call home.

Daryl Hannah Arrested at White House  —  Much-arrested Hollywood actress Daryl Hannah was taken away from the White House in restraints Tuesday afternoon.  —  Hannah was taking part in an ongoing protest against the unbuilt Keystone XL oil pipeline.  —  “Sometimes it's necessary to sacrifice …

Labor leaders must pay for parade if GOP banned, mayor says  —  (Reuters) - The mayor of a Wisconsin town said on Tuesday a local labor council would have to reimburse the city up to $2,000 for a Labor Day parade if organizers exclude Republican lawmakers from attending.

New body ‘liquefaction’ unit unveiled in Florida funeral home  —  Resomation founder Sandy Sullivan explains how the machine works  —  A Glasgow-based company has installed its first commercial “alkaline hydrolysis” unit at a Florida funeral home.  —  The unit by Resomation Ltd is billed …

Obama targets GOP for fall offensive  —  “Kill the body, and the head will die.”  — Joe Frazier  —  President Obama is preparing to fight a political war this fall on two fronts — the first against Republicans who want his job and the second against Republicans who want to make his job more difficult.

Justice Ginsburg: If I Were Nominated Today, My Women's Rights Work For The ACLU Would Probably Disqualify Me  —  Justice Ginsburg During Her Time As Director of the ACLU Women's Rights Project  —  In a speech yesterday at Southern Methodist University law school, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg offered …

Kenneth Melson, acting ATF chief, steps down  —  The man who led the controversial Fast and Furious anti-gun-trafficking operation will step down as the interim head of Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Justice Department announced Tuesday as it named a new acting director for the agency.

Babysitting bill in Calif. Legislature  —  Office of Sen. Doug LaMalfa  —  How will parents react when they find out they will be expected to provide workers' compensation benefits, rest and meal breaks and paid vacation time for...babysitters?  Dinner and a movie night may soon become much more complicated.

Eric Cantor Won't Support Any Hurricane Disaster Funding Without Massive Cuts To First Responders  —  Flooding in Vermont caused by Hurricane Irene  —  In the wake of Hurricane Irene, FEMA is quickly running out of money.  Specifically, FEMA's crucial “disaster-relief fund …

Jane Jamison, R.I.P.  —  Dell Hill from Uncoverage.net called today to tell me that the blog's founder, Jane Jamison, died Saturday.  Dell told me — I hadn't previously known — that her name wasn't actually Jane Jamison, but that this was a pseudonym she used to keep her life …

Is Controversy Selling for Tina Brown?  Newsstand numbers for attention-grabbing covers revealed By Lucia Moses  —  Tina Brown has courted controversy with some of her recent Newsweek cover choices.  Now, newly available sales numbers are showing that those covers did not necessarily translate …

Rick Perry's God  —  Does the Texas governor believe his idiotic religious rhetoric, or is he just pandering for votes?  —  I happened to spend several weeks in Texas earlier this year, while the Lone Star State lay under the pitiless glare of an unremitting drought.

North Carolina Rep Paul Stam Likens Gay Marriage To Incest, Polygamy  —  North Carolina House Majority Leader Paul “Skip” Stam on Tuesday likened gay marriage to incest and polygamy.  —  The 61-year-old Stam made his remarks during a noontime press conference on a proposed constitutional amendment …

Thousands of public employees laid off in 2010  —  (Reuters) - Local and state governments axed more than 200,000 jobs in 2010, according to U.S. Census data released on Tuesday that showed the growing threat of public employee layoffs to the economic recovery.

Father slit throats of three daughters in ‘honour killing’ after they were raped by Gaddafi's troops  —  A father slit the throat of his three teenage daughters in an ‘honour killing’ after they were raped by Gaddafi loyalists during the siege of the port city of Misrata.

Are Virginia's New Abortion Rules the Worst Yet?  —  On Friday evening, Virginia's Department of Health issued a strict new set of rules for abortion clinics—and women's health advocates fear that facilities that can't comply could be shuttered.  —  The regulations require Virginia's 22 clinics …

My First Blogiversary!  —  Today is the Zilla Blog's first birthday!  —  It was one year ago today that I opened this blog, which was originally named PolitiZilla but then I discovered that there was already a website with that name so I changed it to Zilla of the Resistance soon after.

9/11 Coloring Book Draws Criticism for Portrayal of Muslims  —  As the 10th anniversary of 9/11 approaches, one publisher has memorialized it in a manner that's generating a lot of controversy.  Instead of appealing to kids with doe-eyed puppies and flowers, his new coloring book …

Struggling with a great contraction  —  What has the market turmoil of August been telling us?  The answer, I suggest, is three big things: first, the debt-encumbered economies of the high-income countries remain extremely fragile; second, investors have next to no confidence in the ability …

Gloria Steinem To Headline Obama Fundraiser In New York City … WASHINGTON — First Lady Michelle Obama, longtime feminist activist Gloria Steinem and several other prominent Democratic women will be the featured guests at a fundraiser in New York City next month for President Barack Obama's …

Consumer Confidence in U.S. Plunges to Lowest Since 2009 on Jobs Outlook  —  Confidence among U.S. consumers plunged to the lowest level in more than two years as Americans' outlooks for employment and incomes soured.  —  The Conference Board's index slumped to 44.5, the weakest since April 2009 …

AP Interview: Post-9/11 politics of Rudy Giuliani  —  NEW YORK — He was the living symbol of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, a hero to a traumatized nation seeking leadership in a time of crisis.  Walking miles through the streets of Manhattan, Mayor Rudy Giuliani urged New York …